Fizzling on FISA
The Nation | July 1, 2008
A political culture capable of considering fundamental questions on the fate of the Republic would have focused on the dire threat to civil liberties posed by Bush's attempt to gain retroactive immunity for himself and the telecom companies that aided his warrantless wire- tapping schemes. Instead, the talking heads chattered endlessly about the anger of liberal bloggers at Barack Obama's support for the bill, the right wing's derision at his flip-flopping and other ancillary tempests.
But the FISA Amendments Act debate--which finished in the House with a 293-to-129 victory for the White House and is coming to a head in the Senate as we go to press--is about a lot more than Obama and the 2008 campaign. And it is about a lot more than granting immunity to telecoms that violated the privacy rights and trust of their customers. "I don't believe this will be remembered as the 'immunity' bill," says Russ Feingold. Feingold, who with Chris Dodd has led the Senate opposition that Obama once promised to be a part of, is right when he says the bill "is going to be remembered as the legislation in which Congress granted the executive branch the power to sweep up all of our international communications with very few controls or oversight."
It is troubling that Obama fails to recognize that, as Dodd told the Senate, passage of the measure will sanction lawlessness by an Administration that has engaged in "a pattern of abuse against civil liberties and the rule of law [and] against the Constitution."
Continue... Senate votes today.
Obama Knew What The Bill Did
The author of the article said it's troubling that Obama failed to recognize that the legislation would sanction lawlessness by an adminstration that has engage in a pattern of abuse against civil liberties and the rule of law.
He recognized it just fine. He's likely to be the next president, and despite all that talk about 'hope & change", an unlimited executive branch must not sound so bad now that he thinks he'll be the one to sit in the oval office.
I believe that the democrats in the house sold out on FISA, so that they could get the president to sign off on $95 Billion in domestic spending, that was attached to the Iraq funding bill. So they raped the fourth amendment in return for the President allowing them to put us 95 billion dollars more in the hole. Yeah, you gotta love this congress man.
Just to set the record straight.
Obama Statement on FISA
Tuesday, February 12, 2008
Printable Format
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
CONTACT: Michael Ortiz, 202 228 5566
WASHINGTON, D.C. - U.S. Senator Barack Obama (D-IL) today released the following statement on the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act (FISA). Earlier today, Senator Obama voted in favor of the Dodd-Feingold amendment to repeal retroactive immunity for telecommunications companies (S. Amdt. 3907). He also supported other amendments to improve the bill, including the Feingold-Webb-Tester amendment to protect Americans from unwarranted surveillance (S. Amdt. 3979), and the Feingold amendment to protect Americans from the bulk collection of communications (S. Amdt. 3912).
"I am proud to stand with Senator Dodd, Senator Feingold and a grassroots movement of Americans who are refusing to let President Bush put protections for special interests ahead of our security and our liberty. There is no reason why telephone companies should be given blanket immunity to cover violations of the rights of the American people - we must reaffirm that no one in this country is above the law.
"We can give our intelligence and law enforcement community the powers they need to track down and take out terrorists without undermining our commitment to the rule of law, or our basic rights and liberties. That is why I am proud to cosponsor several amendments that protect our privacy while making sure we have the power to track down and take out terrorists.
"This Administration continues to use a politics of fear to advance a political agenda. It is time for this politics of fear to end. We are trying to protect the American people, not special interests like the telecommunications industry. We are trying to ensure that we don't sacrifice our liberty in pursuit of security, and it is past time for the Administration to join us in that effort."
www.paulforronpaul.com
Eff Obama
He could have voted against this legislation, he could have voted to continue debating, he could have filibustered the hell out of it. Instead he rolled over. He can try to spin it all he wants, be we can see exactly what he failed to do on this issue.
"Every generation needs a new revolution" ~Jefferson
Join ours - http://www.ronpaul2008.com
"Every generation needs a new revolution" ~Jefferson
Join ours - http://www.ronpaul2012.com
any chance of undoing it
any chance of undoing it later ?
/Mike
Front Fell Off
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WcU4t6zRAKg
Diggit
Front page now.
Digg here: http://digg.com/world_news/FISA_Amendments_Act_passes_Senate...
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The Antidote to neoCon Koolaid: www.dvds4delegates.com
"We really do have...a once in a lifetime opportunity to take the Republican Party back to where it was." -Kent Snyder, 1959-2008
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"...a nation that is afraid to let its people judge the truth and falsehood in an open market is a nation that is afraid of its people." -John F. Kennedy
can we sue the senate??
has that ever been done... There must be a remedy. Do we in fact claim the current senate to be null and void.
Self Organize.
vote in leaders to units
and we can give them legal authority to represent us.
US.ver 2.0
lets declare the current leaders derelict and in contempt of the constitution.
I have a website http://www.fire-them-all.com
time to act.. soon... now.....
Oaths Betrayed
A moment of silence for the 4th amendment......
"The body is but a vessel for the soul,
A puppet which bends to the soul's tyranny.
And lo, the body is not eternal,
For it must feed on the flesh of others,
Lest it return to the dust whence it came.
Therefore the soul deceives and despises."
treacherous
did they forget it is WE THE PEOPLE
BUMP
no law that congress passes will superseed the supreme law of the land. THE CONSTITUTION.
"One fingered salute to rule of law."
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=No-FJNZdUfU
Some analysis of what this actually means
Fortune Favors the Bold
Being a realist, I fully understand that the intelligence services have always monitored us and disregarded the constitution. They were particularly out of control in the 60's and 70's, and after the Church Comission, FISA was put in place so there would be some sort of oversight. Unfortunately, FISA did in fact give criminal immunity for companies working under orders from the executive. What this bill does is protect said companies from civil liability, as the discovery process would allow a tool for finding out exactly what is being done.
I have read that the bill also grants retro-active immunity to the executive branch. Is this criminal immunity that was not in place before 1978? Any legal scholars?
Fortune Favors the Bold
Looks like it's time
for everyone to go out and buy some CB radios and high powered walkie talkies......Good to know the media didn't start reporting this until today. Just enough time for people to hear about the subject and wonder what the hell they could have done about it. ....And we wonder why people have the attitude that they can't do anything to change it...They don't hear about the issues until the very last minute, unless they have the time like most of us to do the research, and since it already has been passed, instead of rioting in the streets to protest this ridiculous system, they sit back and go with it. I HATE THE MSM !!!!! Our people are uninformed and unenthusiastic, because of them!
ln
its time to win.
http://campaignforliberty.org/
how about dems independents left all coming together joining us?
Yesterday a reporter for CNSNews.com (Cybercast News Service), a right-leaning news organization, asked me to comment on John McCain’s economic plan (.pdf). Among other things, I said: “McCain may have fewer new federal programs in mind than Obama, but his foreign-policy bellicosity is likely to lead to at least as much new spending. Economist Robert Higgs, moreover, has shown that already in 2006 the effective defense budget was nearly $1 trillion, when not just the Pentagon budget but all aspects of defense and defense-induced additions to the national debt are included. McCain has no plans to make a dent in any of that, and yet intends to balance the budget without a tax increase by 2013, while also strengthening the dollar and solving the entitlement crisis. How many more times are conservatives going to let themselves be fooled by such nonsense?
“Former U.S. Comptroller General David Walker says the country faces an entitlement shortfall of $70 trillion in the coming decades. McCain’s response is a lot of boilerplate that won’t change a thing.
Website:
http://www.libertypoet.com/
Twitter:
http://twitter.com/LibertyPoet
"How can we justify to the unemployed and underemployed in the United States the incredible cost of maintaining a global empire?" - Dr. Ron Paul
The Senate DID vote, and (of course) they sold us out.
http://www.breitbart.com/article.php?id=D91QGU2G2&show_artic...
We need to start recall positions against every Senator not running this year who voted for this travesty.
WE NEED
to post who voted for this and get them the hell out of office! FIRE THEM!
I agree
...vote the incumbents out.
gigione
It's going to get worse...
2 weeks ago they passed a carbon copy of this law in Sweden.
Somehow I connect this to Karl Roves visit to Sweden yesterday when he had dinner and a secret discussion with the very people that passed that law.
It sure does look like a simultaneous attack which I guess will occur later in other places as well..
All truths are easy to understand once they are discovered; the point is to discover them. -Galileo Galilei
IT IS DONE 69 to 28 FISA PASSED !
4th Amendment has been shredded. No surprise.
"The Matrix is a system, Neo. That system is our enemy...You have to understand most of these people are not ready to be unplugged. And many of them are so inured so hopelessly dependent on the system that they will fight to protect it". - Morpheus
www.campaignforliberty.com
"It is troubling that Obama fails to recognize..."
"It is troubling that Obama fails to recognize..."
It is troubling that the MSM fails to recognize that these are not mere failures of recognition on the part of Obama.
He has and will continue to "fail to recognize" the key issues that promote the internationalist global fascist conspiracy's agenda.
And "coincidentally" John McCain (his fellow CFR member) will share these same "blind spots".
When it comes to the Council on Foreign Relation's agenda (destruction of the American middle-class, erosion of constitutional liberties, blurring of national boundaries, degradation of the dollar, increasing national debt, etc. leading to a single all-powerful global government controlled by THEM) there will never be any real choices.
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"Of all tyrannies, a tyranny sincerely exercised for the good of its victims may be the most oppressive."
Tar & Feathers
For all who vote yea on this despicable illegal bill, they ought to be tarred and feathered in public and then hung by the neck until dead.
Then go through the rest of those scumbags who are doing everything they can to destroy this nation, whom so many brave men and women have given their very lives to defend.
Their time has come!
" In Thee O Lord do I put my trust " ~ Psalm 31:1~
Yes, they are very arrogant when they realize they are reaching
there own demise. These guys are thugs.
And never forget, “Humans, despite our artistic pretensions, our sophistication and many accomplishments, owe the fact of our existence to a six-inch layer of topsoil and the fact that it rains.”